ts of torture were discovered.

On Good Friday, 1788, fire broke out, and as the priests refused to let
the bells be rung in warning, saying that all bells must be dumb on Good
Friday, the conflagration gained such headway that it could not be
checked, and a large part of the old French town was reduced to ashes.
Six years later another fire equally destructive, completed the work of
blotting out the French town, and the old New Orleans we now know is the
Spanish city which arose in its place: a city not of wood but of adobe
or brick, stuccoed and tinted, of arcaded walks, galleries, jalousies,
ponderous doors, and inner courts with carriage entrances from the
street, and, behind, the most charming and secluded gardens. Also, owing
to premiums offered by Baron Carondelet, the governor, tile roofs came
into vogue, so that the city became comparatively fireproof. Much of the
present-day charm of the old city is due also to the noble Andalusian,
Don Andreas Almonaster y Roxas, who having immigrated and made a great
fortune in the city, became its benefactor, building schools and other
public institutions, the picturesque old Cabildo, or town hall, which is
now a most fascinating museum, the cathedral, which adjoins the Cabildo,
and which, like it, faces Jackson Square, formerly the Place d'Armes. In
front of the altar of his cathedral Don Andreas is buried, and masses
are said, in perpetuity, for his soul. When the Don's young widow
remarried, she and her husband were pursued by a charivari lasting three
days and three nights--the most famous charivari in the history of a
city widely noted for these detestable functions. The Don's daughter, a
great heiress, became the Baronne Pontalba and resided in magnificence
in Paris, where she died, a very old woman, in 1874.

In the Place d'Armes much of the early history of New Orleans, and
indeed, of Louisiana, was written. Here, and in the Cabildo, the
transfers from flag to flag took place, ending with the ceding of
Louisiana by Spain to France, and by France to the United States. At
this time New Orleans had about ten thousand inhabitants, most of the
whites being Creoles.

Harris Dickson, who knows a great deal about New Orleans, declared in an
article published some years ago, that outside lower Louisiana the word
"Creole" is still misunderstood, and added this definition of the term:
"A person of mixed French and Spanish blood, born in Louisiana." As I
understand it, howeve